Sara Leeís story

Sara was born in the then Aden Protectorate in August 1963 whilst her father was a medical officer with the RAF. On their return from Aden the family settled locally, Sara later attending Bexhill College, followed by Hastings College doing a foundation course in fine arts. In 1979 she moved to London to work in the fashion industry ending up as a stylist in fashion photography. Sara was the middle child with an older and younger brother whom she kept firmly in check! She was a loving, but argumentative, part of a close family.

In 1993 Sara was diagnosed with a sarcoma of her wrist. The treatment for this entailed amputating her right arm and chemotherapy. The odds against survival of this type of cancer were nil, but Sara was a fighter and was determined to try to survive. She began to plan her own care alongside her medical treatment. Diet was her first choice; in those days we were not as enlightened as we are today about diet, but Sara went to the Bristol Cancer Help Centre known now as Penny Brohn Cancer Care. There she learnt about diet, relaxation, meditation, and received excellent supportive help from the unit.

On her return to London she sourced her own dietician and spiritual healer who was also an aromatherapist. With their help she lived and worked through the next two years and continued to work until six weeks before her death. During this time she often talked about how wonderful she found her complementary therapies, and hoped we could do something for people with cancer who found it difficult to source their own therapies and pay for them. After her death her family and friends set up the Sara Lee Trust to allow others to experience what Sara had achieved, to live life to the full, in spite of the cancer within.